Lockdowns in a School Setting Part I

Three things I like about my school district’s lockdown plan are that: 1) it is direct and does not use codes, 2) there are two types of lockdown alerts—one for warning and one for intruders, and 3) there are special lockdown considerations in case the alert occurs between periods, during the lunch hour, during the pre-school hours or during the post-school hours.

Three things that I would suggest be changed about the lockdown plan are: 1) there is no warning as to where the intruder is. A communication strategy should be developed that gives teachers a heads up on where the intruder was last cited. Cameras would help to validate this information. 2) The lockdown plan does not include a process for isolating the dangerous incident or removing students and teachers from the threat on campus. 3) Teachers are told to prepare a list of missing students but there is no way to communicate with other staff to let teachers know if a missing student has been picked up, and this can cause unnecessary stress and strain on faculty and the students’ peers.

The lockdown plan does relate needed material in a short amount of time with as few words as possible. For a dangerous situation on campus happening among students, the alert consists of: “Lockdown warning,” and this is repeated several times over the course of a minute. Immediately, teachers are prompted to enter into lockdown protocol. However, there is no way for teachers to communicate with one another or with the administration other than through the use of cell phones. A special system should be available that allows teachers and staff to communicate directly in case there...

Sitting in lockdown made while awaiting future instructions can be very stressful especially if students begin frantically calling for a escape or evacuation plan out of fear. The best thing to do in a lockdown situation is to have open lines of communication so that everyone is alert as to what is happening in real time (Zhe & Nickerson, 2007; Bergh, 2009).
The plan also tells what teachers need to know in a short, concise manner, keeping in mind time is critical; however, I would like the plan to address a mode of communication—even something as simple as two-way radios or walkie-talkies would be of use in a situation like this and the lockdown plan does not provide a strategy for teachers to use in terms of how to communicate with one another effectively throughout the lockdown process. The alert information is solid—but once the notification has been given and the initial action steps have been taken there is a remarkable blank that needs to be addressed, especially considering how tense and strenuous the next few moments if not hours can become.

The lockdown plan does not require any modifications to me or my specific workplace station, other than the need to get students away from windows and to keep them all together during the process. My workstation is a typical classroom so nothing is out of the ordinary in this respect.

Should teachers and staff be trained ahead of time on how to conduct themselves, what modes of communication to use as they traverse the tense and frightening moments following a lockdown alert, then my view of the lockdown plan would improve. For now, the plan does not acknowledge that…